Is it fair for Nigeria to have been be put on a list of 14 nations considered sponsors of terrorism or “countries of interest?” While complaining that the screw-up in the case of Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab rests primarily with U.S. intelligence agencies, this editorial from Nigeria’s Daily Independent lacks the reflexive defensiveness seen from the country in recent days. It contains plenty...

I’d like to start today’s posting by shaming everyone who has not kept their new year resolutions.  What’s wrong with you people, is this really how you want to start a new decade? Those of you who’ve kept your resolutions, I want to castigate you for picking such lame and easily achievable goals. For those of you who cowardly avoided resolutions all together, well I have nothing but indifference for...

A dispute is raging in Malaysia about whether Christians have the right to use the world “Allah” — and it has now resulted in three churches being firebombed. The government of the country where 60 percent of its residents are Muslim had banned Roman Catholics from using “Allah” for God in their publications but a high court has now overturned the policy. The result: turmoil. The...

Jodi Kantor’s profile of Bart Stupak is mostly about his image of himself as a persecuted maverick because of the stand he has taken against abortion coverage in his party’s health care legislation.

For many months I have been writing in support of publicly honoring our fallen heroes when they touch American soil at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware—of course, with the approval of the family of each hero. On February 26, 2009, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates announced a policy consistent with what we presently have at Arlington National Cemetery which allows the family to decide whether to allow...

A month ago on December 7, 2009, I wrote a post about the professional Golfer extraordinaire that upset some TMV readers. Good. I like plenty of controversy and getting people mad – something that I learned to abuse to the benefit of my clients during my former law practice. I ranted against the overall meaningless ethical and moral code of the wealthiest people on the planet. I also ridiculed the many...

From the very heart of fundamentalist Christian religious rightness — Donald Douglas at American Power — comes a statement I never thought I would hear from his lips (so to speak):

For being the world’s only Superpower and global empire, we certainly are a pathetic, fearful, demented, wimpy, and easily frightened group. Our shores are filled with Chicken Little’s screaming about Al Qaida and airport security at the drop of a terrorist’s underwear. Now let’s get a grip on our emotions running amok and start thinking as rational human beings. I’m ashamed of many Americans in politics...

Blogger Ann Althouse says that Brit Hume “evangelized” golfer Tiger Woods in this clip from Fox News. Many of Althouse’s commenters seemed to agree and they didn’t like it. I have a slightly different take on the matter from that of Althouse or some of her readers. The term “evangelize” is rooted in the New Testament word euangelion, meaning good news. (The New Testament...

I always wonder what those who hold the view that homosexuality is wrong, a crime against God and nature, want. If it’s really that bad shouldn’t it be punished? It seems to me a binary choice, accept it and hold it to all the rights and obligations of society, or… The title of this post is from Uganda’s minister of ethics and integrity, as quoted in this important NYTimes story on the role...

‘THE TRAVELS OF THE MAGI’ A little over a week after the alleged terrorist attack aboard an American aircraft, a pattern is emerging. While European writers tend to think new U.S. rules for passengers are ineffective if not absurd, many Arab columnists believe that the suspicious aspects of the case suggest that some kind of plot to demonize Muslims and extend the war on terror is involved. For...

Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

For West Asia, 2010 has not begun well. The mess in Iran is increasing by the day and holds peril unprecedented for the entire region. If the government, however reprehensible, falls into disarray the real possibility arises of a huge arc of violent political and civil instability stretching through Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Palestine to Israel. The possibility of a new American war is small but...

Fox News’ Brit Hume has a solution for how Tiger Woods can be forgiven for his sins: become a Christian: FOOTNOTE: I know rabbi who is having problems. I’ll be sure to pass it on to him. How nice it is to know that we now have someone we watch who can give us the news, impart to viewers how he really feels about issues and politicians he covers, and give us the answer to eternal questions —...

For some, exasperation with new U.S. rules for passenger aircraft is running high. Why? Because, according to German columnist Andreas Theyssen, by almost any objective measure, the new regulations being imposed won’t do a thing to make flying any safer. For Germany’s Financial Times Deutschland, columnist Andreas Theyssen writes in part: There are many ways to encapsulate the state of the world....

Was this sheer incompetence – or is there something else going on? The scale of the intelligence mistakes surrounding the case of suspected Christmas Day underwear bomber Omar Farouk Abdul Muttalab are such, that many people, particularly Muslims, suspect that there is some “hidden force” behind the story. According to columnist Hilmi Al Asmar of Jordan’s Ad Dustour newspaper, that...

THE NOSE OF AHMADINEJAD SAYS: ‘ELECTIONS’ THE CAPTION READS: ‘OPPOSITION’ This article from Iran’s state-controlled Kayhan newspaper is as close to a public admission of a challenge to the regime’s authority as we’ve seen from the mullahs that run the country – and it’s striking. For Kayhan, columnist Kian Mokhtari writes in part: There’s no denying...

Happy New Year Moderate Voice people! So which superpower or superpower pretender had the best year in 2009? Was it China, Russia or the United States? According to columnist Fyodor Lukyanov of the Russian newspaper Gazeta – the answer is unequivocally China. Outlining the challenges both the United States and Russia have in dealing with the new powerhouse, for Gazeta, Fyodor Lukyanov writes in part: Argentine...

Could we be seeing a bit of a revival of the legacy of George W. Bush? That’s the underlying implication of this article by Yves Thréard of France’s Le Figaro newspaper. For Le Figaro, Yves Threard writes in part: Humility prohibits untimely and definitive comments on al-Qaeda, that army of criminals that is regularly described as being held at bay. Does it function under a centralized command...

Earlier this month — around the time Sen. Ben Nelson’s United Methodist Church was chiming in on health care reform — Washington University announced the formation of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion & Politics, named for the former Senator who offered a (very good) book on the same topic in 2006. This confluence of events was the subject of my latest guest commentary for St. Louis...

Let me begin by making it clear that I’m not suggesting the following idea should be adopted or that it would work, I merely offer it as an interesting hypothetical. So please skip if you can comments on that angle. It came to me via a radio show I was listening to on the way home from running errands. The host was discussing the bizzare rules of engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan which, according to...

Karl Rove, that fierce defender of “traditional marriage” and fanatical conservative activist against same-sex marriage, and his second wife, have divorced.

An interesting, if somewhat inflammatory article comes to us today from Barbara Kay at Pajamas Media, in which she calls upon “the West” (however we are to define that term today) to ban the burqa and nix the niqab. She pulls no punches and comes right out of the gate praising France and Nicolas Sarkozy (of all people) for their attempts to ban the primarily Muslim full body covering for women in...

So what do people in The Netherlands think of the issue of air safety, after Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport was used as an entry point into the United States for what seems to have been al-Qaeda’s latest suicide-madman? In typical, practical Dutch fashion, the NRC Handlesblad, in an editorial written yesterday, picks apart recent criticism and concludes that those who seek “total safety”...

Is it time for the United States to segregate Muslim passengers and force them to fly on Muslim-only flights? That is just one of the politically-incorrect suggestions of Khadir Taahar, an Arab-Muslim and a regular columnist for Iraq’s Kitabat newspaper, who authored this article for Britain’s Arabic Elaph news portal. For Elaph, Taahar writes in part: Yesterday, Allah made sure that the crime...